Friday, August 23, 2013

This post serves a number of purposes in that it is 'designed' to address the people who have commented over the life-cycle of this 'blog'. Yeah, the tenth stage of a life-cycle that I have only recently learned about through interaction with a beloved elder who, despite the medication, was well aware he was at Stage X, the transitory phase that includes mottling and cyanosis... his extremities had begun to cool.

Thursday, August 8, 2013

“No, that’s not her
posthumous ‘name’. She’s been off the radar for quite some time now. An
intentional move. A choice. She could possibly still be alive... maybe in a shelter.”

You’re talking about one
of your aunts?

“Yeah.”

Not the one who married
the Fro…

“No. From the other
side... from out of the light, not the shadows.”

Go on.

“What I still find peculiar
is the way things have kind of just happened. Like the last time I saw her, I
don’t remember her even speaking to me. I could hardly recognize her through the window. Not that the fasting had changed her looks other
than making her appear painfully thin, almost skeletal if it weren’t for her
healthy color.

You see, she still was good
about nutrition. Very careful in fact.

The 'her' I didn’t not recognize didn’t acknowledge me. We had
no conversation that I can recall.

But, as it turns out, she’d
remembered me because she left this…

Here’s her writing on the
inside cover.

Her message... her
‘recognition’ of me comes mainly from a time before I was even ten years old.
And she still pegged it. Even after all that time... and this time.

When she first came to
visit, before I was ten, her presence was discovered quite by accident. Behind
a closed door of the spare bedroom was a steady and indecipherable voice that,
to a child’s mind, at first sounded like some kind of alien.

"Pasted on the inside of the book was 'everyone'"

Despite being scared, we
opened up the door anyway. Kneeling on the floor, hands on in the ‘prayer
position’ on the bed, was a woman with her eyes closed and speaking in
tongues. She was kind enough to explain that a little later when she had finished her communion
or whatever it was.

During her ‘visit’...”

Wait, I thought you said she
was homeless?

“Yeah, she’s been homeless
for as long as I can remember. Homeless in the sense of having no fixed address
and no more possessions than what she carries with her. Admittedly, she has
taken advantage of shelters from time to time. Or a family’s hospitality. She knew people.”

About that visit?

“Okay... yeah… that visit.
That was probably the first time I met her. Or even knew that she existed.
Definitely different. Different for a number of reasons. But before I get into
those, I have to thank her for taking the time out to recognize who I was, even
at that age. I mean, nearly ten and with no brother around, I had no one to
wrestle with. Wasn’t about to try that with Step-dad-one. At that age, most
adults wouldn’t rough house with kids. But she would. Tough and strong. Now
that I think about it, her survival routine would have kept her in very good
shape. At least when she wasn't 'sick'.”

You once said she’d taught
you things?

“Yeah. She taught me about
carob and how to sing הבה
נגילה.”

But you are גוי?

“Yeah, I guess. But there
was other stuff.”

Like what?

“The big words that named
the problems. Kind of like the art she left, pasted on the inside of the book.”

And she left you that
book the last time you met?

“Yeah, the last time we met.
When she didn’t even acknowledge me, so I thought. But she was speaking to her
little sister, the one who ended up taking care of everyone. And I still
haven’t got the stories straight.”

Stories?

“Yeah. Like how nervous
breakdowns seem to run in the family. 183’s father was 160, or somewhere around
there. He’d actually belonged to the club, that roundtable where ‘intelligent’
people are supposed to sit. Only thing is, people were waaay too far into their own heads to really know how to communicate. No one would listen. Not where he was.”

That’s funny.

“Yeah. Peculiar. 183 was
even brighter. Which is somehow related to her idiosyncrasies, her choice to
‘not belong’ to society. Now, her navigational skills may seem fairly
remarkable to some, but when you live on the streets, you pay attention to when
libraries are open where there is plenty of time for reflection. And she could
and did read. Areas with mild climates allowed her to ‘live in the hills’ with nothing
more than maybe a tarp.”

You’re laughing.

“Yeah. Just remembered how
her younger sister said we weren’t to use the plastic blue sheet when we were
painting. 183 had complained we were messing up her home. Apparently, that was
her shelter for the hills. Where she lived.”

Why now? Why all these
thoughts and memories?

“If I could answer that
question… no… it doesn’t need answering. What’s important is that I am able to
have these thoughts and memories. I hadn’t seen that book, really opened it, in
quite some time. Only now am I able to kind of understand where everyone was
coming from.”

Living in a kind of more
rural area where your neighbor might
be an acre or so away, most people had the habit of leaving their doors open.
Doesn’t really make sense to lock anything when you spend most of your time
outside anyway.

In the evenings, before the
bugs came out, the top part of the door was usually open when dinner was being
made. Last minute salads were picked from the garden throughout most of the
year. Miss those Such a nice place.

Anyway.

Well, usually near dinner
time, this big thug of a dog who could’ve probably afforded to loose a bit of
that extra weight… Sid, he’d kind of slowly find his way up onto the back porch
and stand there for a few minutes.

If no one was giving him any
attention or at least pretending not to notice, he’d start to whine a little,
kind of lettin’ folks know that he was stopping by and would sure appreciate
one of them special dog biscuits we’d somehow not forgotten to picked up just
for him.

Nobody really remembers when
he first started showing up. We never really knew where he lived. And it’s not
like he wasn’t well fed. He was kind of known for making the rounds in a way
that made you smile when he came by. He’d hang out for just a little while,
long enough to charm his way into your heart for those few scraps of whatever
you might not really need.

No, never did figure out
where he lived.

But we know where he died.

There was a school not too
far away where people really should have been minding the speed limit when they
drove by. No matter how big those yellow signs were, people just couldn’t slow
down.

Funny thing about Sid, he
wasn’t shy about holding up traffic even after he’d left a dent or two.

Word was, someone heard
another screech from the wheels of a pickup truck that really should have been
going a hell of a lot slower. Instead of the
usual follow up of profanity, that final day, the skid marks were punctuated with a pretty solid
thud.